Blood Bonds(The Bonds That Tie #3)(35)

North’s bond tilts his head like it’s considering. “What secrets do you want just between us?”

I smile, because the bond talks just like mine does and it makes it easier to speak to it. “None. I just think he’ll be upset at me for asking why he’s so worried about you being around me. If you’re this ready to protect me then… Why is he scared?”

The bond leans down until his nose bumps against mine softly, like it’s afraid even now of hurting me. “The lie. He believes the lie because the truth is too painful. Even now that it’s started to unravel around him, he can’t let it go.”

The lie?

Whether he sees my confusion or just chooses to keep going, I don’t know, but the words keep coming out of him nonetheless. “Bonds cannot hurt each other. They cannot kill each other, not with intent or by accident. But if he believes the truth, then everything he has held on to for all of this time will be meaningless.”

My eyebrows bunch together, but then the bond pushes forward again, sealing our lips together, and I’m kissing North for the first time. Only he’s not the one kissing me. His bond is pushing me backward on the countertop and his tongue is sweeping into my mouth, taking over me and branding my very soul with his mark.

I panic a little, only because of what North will think of this, but he breaks away from me without pushing for more.

His palm takes hold of my chin, and he speaks to me one last time. “No more running.”





The moment the bond slips away from North, he’s grabbing me, pulling me up and into his arms desperately, and hauling ass into his bedroom as though he can leave his bond and everything said between us behind. For a second, I think he’s going to throw me out of the room for talking to his bond and accidentally uncovering a family secret.

One I’m still wrapping my head around.

But when he spreads me out on his bed, his body immediately covers my own, and this time when his lips touch mine, I know that it’s all him in there and not his bond taking over.

They kiss differently.

Is that a weird thing to notice? Probably. Where the bond was a dark possession, North is a consuming force. He wants me, there’s no doubting it, but he wants everything. I can barely stop myself from getting swept up in him, losing myself when we’ve barely even started.

“What did it say to you? What did it do?”

I blink up at him, and then a slow smile stretches over my cheeks. “It’s devoted to me. It’s not going to hurt me. North? I believe it. I know that neither of you will hurt me.”

He stares at me, his eyes locked onto mine, and there’s a need inside of him that I can see so clearly, a need for me to trust him and believe exactly what he’s capable of.

I already know it.

He moves slowly to pull the towel away from my body, as though he’s still giving me time to change my mind and put a stop to this. I’m not going to, even with the impending freak out over my power growing, I know that this is exactly what I need right now.

I can worry about the consequences later.

When he kisses me again, shoving the towel off of the bed as though he’s worried about it jumping back onto my body and covering me up once again, I forget about everything except his lips on mine. I forget about the Bonding and the beings who live inside us, even now straining towards each other. I forget that we’re anything more than humans who want each other.

Then North’s gift joins the party and shatters any chances of pretending that we’re anything but Gifted Bonds.

The lights are on in the bedroom and bright through the open doorway to the bathroom, but the moment his gift bursts out of him, there’s nothing but darkness around us both. I expect to be surrounded by his creatures, to find August staring at me and waiting for pets, but instead there’s only darkness.

A surprise but not a bad one. I can totally handle Bonding in his shadows.

His eyes stay blue, his level of control even in this situation is completely insane to me, but it’s as though this is the small part of his bond he’s willing to share me with right now, and I can get on board.

The tug on my ankle takes me by surprise.

I glance at North’s hands first just to check that he’s not messing with me, but then I feel the thing slide up my calf to circle my thigh and spread my legs out even further.

Before I have to chance to freak the fuck out, more of the shadows come out to grab me, one over each limb and splaying me out for North’s viewing pleasure. He watches it all with rapt attention, an air of smug male surrounding him.

This is all at his command.

The shadow limbs might as well be restraints for how firmly they hold me down. Living ropes that move at North’s every whim. I should have guessed he’d be full of these sorts of surprises in the bedroom.

When he moves to lick and suck his way across my chest, one of his hands slipping down between my thighs, I want to move my arms to bury my hands in his hair but the tendrils of smoke tighten around my wrists, pulling until my back arches off of the bed. North’s lips close over my nipple as his teeth nip at the sensitive nub.

I’m in sensation overload.

How the hell he thought I could handle this without ever reaching my peak and Bonding with him is baffling, because his fingers barely graze over my clit and my entire soul begins to shake.

Then he moves his freaking hand.